Counties hope to quell Pa. voting law confusion

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Some county officials said Tuesday they will try to refresh voters’ understanding of Pennsylvania’s fractured election laws before the upcoming primary elections.

Although they do not anticipate major problems in the May 21 balloting — especially given the typically small turnout for municipal and judicial elections — officials from counties across the state said it is important voters clearly understand the status of the new voter-identification law amid a lawsuit challenging its constitutionality set for trial in July.

Voter-education efforts will focus on “what will be expected and what will not be expected,” said Frank X. Custer, communications director for Montgomery County.

Enforcement of the most significant part of the new law — a requirement that voters show photo ID at the polls — will not be in effect for the primary under an agreement struck last week between the state and the plaintiffs who sued.

Advertisement

Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson, who ordered that the provision not be enforced in the presidential election last fall after a battle that reached the state Supreme Court, approved the latest agreement Tuesday.

Voters will be permitted to cast ballots in the primary even if they don’t have a valid photo ID, although a provision of the law that is not affected by the litigation requires poll workers to ask them for it anyway.

“We don’t have an option of not asking,” said Jeffrey Greenburg, Mercer County’s elections chief and chairman of the Western Pennsylvania Election Personnel Association, which represents counties in the western half of the state.

Compounding the confusion is the fact that people voting in a polling place for the first time are required under existing law to show identification, although non-photo IDs including a firearm permit or a utility bill are acceptable.

Most Pennsylvanians who vote by absentee ballot have been required since last fall to provide proof of identification, which can include their Pennsylvania driver’s license number, the last four digits of their Social Security number or a copy of a photo ID that is acceptable under the new law. They can provide that information to country elections officials by telephone, email or regular mail.

Pennsylvanians who are in the military, their families and civilians who are living overseas may cast absentee ballots and are exempt from the new voter-ID law.

Nearly 233,000 voters cast absentee ballots in the November election, said State Department spokesman Ron Ruman.

Some voters were clearly confused by the rules in November. Greenburg said some sent in their actual driver’s licenses with their absentee ballot application.

“We promptly mailed those back to the voter,” he said.

Other local elections officials did not plan any special voter-outreach efforts.

In Centre County, “the issues have been very minor,” said elections chief Joyce McKinley.

In the primary, Democrats and Republicans will nominate candidates for elective offices that include a single opening on the state appellate-court bench, mayorships, county judgeships and thousands of other local elective offices.